Its authors found that high school students learning programming do better with
block-based languages than with text-based languages, and the impact is greatest
for female and minority students. I really want to include this result in the
next version of Teaching Tech Together, so I
contacted the lead author and asked for help summing up the conclusions. The
paper’s original abstract is:

Visual block-based programming environments (VBBPEs) such as Scratch and Alice
are increasingly being used in introductory computer science lessons across
elementary school grades. These environments, and the curricula that
accompany them, are designed to be developmentally-appropriate and engaging
for younger learners but may introduce challenges for future computer science
educators. Using the final projects of 4th, 5th, and 6th grade students who
completed an introductory curriculum using a VBBPE, this paper focuses on
patterns that show success within the context of VBBPEs but could pose
potential challenges for teachers of follow-up computer science instruction.
This paper focuses on three specific strategies observed in learners’
projects: (1) wait blocks being used to manage program execution, (2) the use
of event-based programming strategies to produce parallel outcomes, and (3)
the coupling of taught concepts to curricular presentation. For each of these
outcomes, we present data on how the course materials supported them, what
learners achieved while enacting them, and the implications the strategy poses
for future educators. We then discuss possible design and pedagogical
responses. The contribution of this work is that it identifies early computer
science learning strategies, contextualizes them within
developmentally-appropriate environments, and discusses their implications
with respect to future pedagogy. This paper advances our understanding of the
role of VBBPEs in introductory computing and their place within the larger
K-12 computer science trajectory.

The final summary is:

A growing number of studies have found that block-based programming tools like
Scratch are a more effective way to introduce kids to programming than
traditional text-based tools. What’s more, the gains in performance are
largest among female students and students from underrepresented minorities.
People are starting to notice — for example, the new AP Computer Science
Principles exam asks students questions using both blocks and text — so if
you are teaching programming at the K-12 level, start your learners with
blocks.

I don’t think the second is a dumbed-down version of the first, any more than I
think blocks are dumbed-down text. Instead, I think they are different tools
intended for different audiences with different priorities. The first is aimed
at the authors’ fellow academics; the second is for busy practitioners who want
to know what they should do or change today. It’s like the research
summaries I
read when my siblings and my father had cancer, and I think researchers would
have a lot more impact if they wrote actionable briefs like this for their work.

It Will Never Work In Theory was our attempt to
do this for empirical software engineering; it didn’t catch on, but maybe it
would be worth trying again for computing education research.